The Darkest Days

Piece of Me

I loved him the way every princess loves their prince

Things were perfect in the most cliche of ways

I loved him the way pyrotechnics love flames

He was the sky and the planets and everything in between

They always are in the beginning

And just like every love I've had before him, the peace was broken almost instantly

We wouldn't have made it anyway, but it keeps me occupied to think what we could have

You were what I prayed for every night and what I dreamed of every day

I had you in my mind the way the school lessons should have been

You were the most vivid image inside my head, the sharpest wish on my tongue

 I invented you in the most desperate space in my imagination

When you were finally mine, I couldn't help but reach out to touch you

Even with your arms around me and your lips against mine, you felt like a fading dream

Even still, when I felt you disappearing, it felt so very real to me

You left as quickly as you appeared, and you took a piece of me with you

You still have that piece of me, it's dying in your hands

You cared when you left, but I was shattered and you couldn't stand it

It was you, not me; it was you, it was us, it was too soon

Eventually, it would be me

You would spend too much time seeing the darkness inside of my mind

And you would proceed choke the life out of that piece of me

You would strangle it until it died and I felt it breathe its last breath

Every love takes a piece of me with them when they leave

I've felt each fiber of my being die each time they go

It heals with time but the pain takes so much out of me

Healing takes longer because the pain has knocked the air from my lungs

Please stop taking pieces of me

Please stop killing shards of me

Please stop choking the life from me

Please stop forcing me to watch myself die over and over and over again

I don't even know if I'm holding myself together anymore